In the early 1990s, professionals began to question how to address offender computer use while on supervision, but in the past ten years, tools emerged that were specifically developed for triage and field forensics. As these were rapidly embraced, it was still unclear what professionals could look for, how to look for it, and how to interpret what they found. This unique book resolves those issues. The book provides a clear outline of what can and should be done regarding the management of offender computer use. Not only does the text help community corrections professionals understand how to monitor computer use, but it helps realize how information gained during monitoring can assist in overall case management. The book takes the reader through all the paces of managing offender cyber-risk and is meant specifically for pretrial, probation, parole, and community sanction officers. The chapters are organized by major areas, such as community corrections and cyberspace, understanding the options, condition legality, operational legality, accessing cyber-risk, computer education, principles of effective computer monitoring, search and seizure, deploying monitoring software, and online investigations. Additionally, numerous appendices provide a wealth of information regarding model forms, questionnaires, and worksheets. This book moves the reader toward a more informed use of the technology that is now readily available to effectively manage offenders’ digital behavior.

Interestingly, I wrote an application as a theory/framework for probation officers to manage offenders in the earlier part of the 2000s. The application ran on a machine, monitored connections from the machine to the Internet, maintained a thumbnail system that allowed a probation officer to see any image viewed by an offender. Maintained and tracked the cookies stored on a browser, bookmarked pages and forum names used by the offender. It also kept a running list of software installed by an offender and raised alerts at the indication of steganographic and cryptographic applications installed by the user.

It was under 15k and ran under Linux, BSD and Solaris since the individuals I was working with at the time complained their hands were tied as they really didn't understand Unix based operating systems. Once all the data was pulled from the machine, it PGP encrypted it and transferred data over via SSH key using both an MD5 ad SHA1 checksum to ensure it came from Machine X and ONLY machine X.

I had a fully running version that was scrapped because of issues of privacy and the courts never detailing/specifying what was and wasn't allowable. This was almost 10 years ago and I am sure nothing has changed regarding the monitoring of offenders. Hence repeat offenders.